NASA commissions space washing machine for astronauts’ dirty laundry

It seems that when you’re in space, you will no longer have the luxury of changing your underwear everyday. Instead astronauts only get to change their underwear every 3-4 days. This is due to the costs of sending goods into space which reportedly costs between $5,000-$10,000 per 500g, making sending a daily supply of underwear a ridiculously expensive experience. So much so that NASA has tasked a small disinfectant business UMPQUA to create a washing machine that can be used in space.

The prototype that NASA has commissioned will be a low-water, low-power washing machine that can be used 250 miles above the earth’s surface or on any of NASA’s bases on the Moon or on Mars. Based on what has been proposed, this space-bound washing machine will use a combination of jets of vapor, air and microwave rays to clean the clothes.

On a side note, UMPQUA has stated that it seems the machine has also managed to achieve “greatly enhanced softness” over the traditional washing machine, although safe to say it will not come cheap.